http://38north.org/2014/12/aberger122314/
Is Ethiopia Violating UN Sanctions against North Korea
By Andrea Berger
23 December 2014
Introduction
Since the 1970s, Ethiopia has been in the company of North Korea’s
most loyal military customers. Amongst other things, Pyongyang has
been a source of munitions, armored personnel carriers, tanks and tank
parts, artillery and rocket fuel. In addition to these forms of
assistance, North Korea has helped Ethiopia construct, operate and
upgrade two weapons factory complexes—today known as the Gafat
Armament Industry and Homicho Ammunition Industry. From Ethiopia’s
perspective, contracting to North Korea for the initial supply of
weapons production technology was a means of reducing long-term
dependence on foreign military suppliers. (More comically, according
to the Ethiopian Chief of Defence Staff, North Korea’s help in this
regard also allows Ethiopia to meet its peacekeeping obligations).[1]
Yet in practice, the effects of Ethiopia’s investment have been mixed.
On the one hand, it has indeed learned to build certain varieties of
small arms and munitions domestically, and now even exports its wares
to countries like Sudan.[2] On the other hand, it does not seem to
have been able to easily or entirely eschew North Korean assistance,
and may still depend upon their goods and services.
Securing North Korean help to establish and operate arms factories in
the late 1980s was neither politically poisonous, nor outright
illegal, in the way that it is today. It was first with UN Security
Council Resolution 1874 (2009) that a clear prohibition against
purchasing “all arms and related materiel, as well as…technical
training, advice, services or assistance related to the provision,
manufacture, maintenance or use of such arms or materiel” from North
Korea was articulated. For this reason, the UN Panel of Experts
(established pursuant to Resolution 1874) has taken interest in signs
of recent, continuing involvement of DPRK entities in the operations
of the Homicho Ammunition Industry. And it is for the same reason that
further investigation is needed into potential North Korean links with
the second small arms plant in Ethiopia—the Gafat Armament
Industry—about which new information, dating to the period shortly
before the passage of UN Security Council Resolution 1874, has come to
light.
Capacity Building
Ethiopia is neither the first, nor the only country to have lusted
after an indigenous arms manufacturing capability and paid Pyongyang
to help. Such facilities are peppered across the globe, in countries
as diverse as Madagascar, Syria, Libya, Iran and possibly Uganda.
North Korean-designed ballistic missile production lines throughout
the Middle East are the most well-known examples of Pyongyang’s
efforts to bolster the indigenous capacity of foreign friends.
Factories producing small arms and ammunition, light weapons and some
heavier conventional systems are less renowned, but are equally
relevant to the implementation of the current sanctions regime against
the DPRK.
For North Korea, the design and manufacture of arms factories (or
individual arms production lines) in foreign countries remains an
evident market opportunity. Most countries with export-oriented
military industrial complexes are reluctant to assist another country
in developing a level of indigenous capability that eventually reduces
the customer’s dependency on foreign supply. However, in this respect
as in many others, North Korea is not ‘most countries.’ It has proven
more than willing to earn profit in the short-term by helping foreign
friends learn to make their own weapons, even if that means losing
revenue in the future. For example, in a 2004 meeting between the
Nigerian Vice President and Yang Hyong Sop—the Vice President of the
Presidium of the Supreme People’s Assembly—the latter proposed that
North Korea provide Nigeria with ammunition production assistance.[3]
The Homicho Ammunition Industry
The first of two Ethiopian defence industry sites believed to have
ties to North Korea—the Homicho Ammunition Industry—was established in
1987 as ‘Project 130’ and subsumed under the parastatal Metals and
Engineering Corporation (METEC) in 2010. Based near Ambo, its
production lines include: small, medium and heavy ammunition; tank
shells, mortar bombs and grenades; and 120mm ‘Katyusha’ rockets.[4]
The Homicho complex is the largest North Korean-assisted site.
Initially, Pyongyang’s involvement probably centered on the design and
establishment of production lines for munitions. These forms of
assistance apparently continued through to at least late 2007, and
included help manufacturing rocket-propelled grenades and
truck-mounted multiple rocket launchers.
Around the same time, it also became clear that Ethiopia was suffering
from dependency on North Korean spare parts and machinery for the
factory. Because of their (presumably antique) North Korean design
heritage, Homicho’s production lines use specific parts and machines,
for which there are apparently few cost-effective available sources
outside of Pyongyang.[5] Sunk costs in those facilities would have
similarly made re-tooling a pricey affair.
Homicho’s centrality to the Ethiopia-North Korea relationship has made
it a subject of intense interest and scrutiny. Until at least 2009,
and likely thereafter, the US Embassy in Addis Ababa[6] continually
exerted pressure on senior Ethiopian officials to sever related
contracts with North Korea, much like the US had previously done with
governments in Libya and Yemen. In November 2008, it appeared that
this pressure might finally yield greater cooperation by the Ethiopian
Ministry of Defense, which agreed to let the US Ambassador and a small
team into Homicho the following month. Only a few days before the
visit was scheduled to take place, the Defence Minister resigned and
US access was promptly suspended. The Embassy was told that ‘there
would be no problem with the visit if Ethiopia were to get technology
or financial assistance from it.’ It is unclear whether access was
successfully facilitated thereafter, though the initial offer suggests
that the Ethiopian government may at least be open to greater
transparency.[7]
In 2014, the UN Panel of Experts spotted public evidence of a possible
continuing link between North Korea and the Homicho Ammunition
Industry—by then controlled by METEC. Homicho’s official company
profile listed the ‘Korea Mineral Trading General Corporation’ as one
of its primary suppliers: an entity that does not appear in South
Korean company registries. Given the factory’s history, it is
therefore reasonable to assume that the company is North Korean.
Supporting this conclusion is the fact that reference to the Korea
Mineral Trading General Corporation was swiftly removed from the
Homicho website following the publication of the UN Panel’s report[8]
(though they apparently forgot to sanitize the accompanying PDF
brochure).[9]
Gafat Armament Engineering Industry
The second site known to have been assisted by North Korea in the past
is the Gafat Armament Engineering Industry, located near Debre Zeit.
Gafat was opened in 1989, two years after the Homicho plant. While
originally built to manufacture AK-47s and light machine guns, in 2002
it was incorporated into METEC (which also controls Homicho) and was
upgraded to produce ‘40mm grenade launchers and other automatic
weapons attached on armored vehicles and helicopters’ as well as
‘heavy artillery and howitzers.’ Around this time Gafat’s remit was
also allegedly expanded to include armament maintenance.[10]
In addition to the confirmation of early North Korean involvement in
Gafat offered in leaked US cables, a glance at marketing material for
Gafat highlights the evident overlap between the weapons systems North
Korea is able to indigenously produce, and those that Gafat now
manufactures.
(Click to enlarge) Gafat Armament Industry brochure. Photo: Metals and
Engineering Corporation
Many of the systems shown above are ones that North Korea is able to
produce.[11] Of course, it is worth noting that North Korea originally
received or reverse-engineered many of these same systems from the
Soviet Union or China, and therefore the Gafat designs bear
resemblance to weapons produced by those countries as well. The
twin-barreled anti-aircraft gun that is depicted (originally a Soviet
design), or twelve-barrel multiple rocket launcher (originally a
Chinese design) are examples. Worthy of note is the tear gas gun shown
in the top right of the Gafat brochure. A gun of strikingly similar
design was photographed in the hands of North Korea’s People’s
Security Minister while on a 2013 visit to Uganda—a country also
suspected of having received North Korean assistance in indigenous
weapons production.[12] While not conclusive evidence, a commonality
between many of the designs featured in Gafat’s marketing material is
their familiarity to North Korea’s own defense industrial complex.
A gun of strikingly similar design to one shown on the Gafat brochure
was photographed in the hands of North Korea’s People’s Security
Minister while on a 2013 visit to Uganda. Photo: AFP.
More concrete evidence of North Korean involvement in operations at
Gafat dates to late 2007. An industrial engineering study of the
complex’s inefficiencies, published by the University of Addis Ababa,
speaks of a contract with the ‘Korea Ryong Bong General Corporation,’
active at the time of writing in late 2007, to retool production lines
for the AK-47 and AK-103.[13] Records of conversations between General
Samora and US officials in 2008 discuss what seems to be the same
contract between the governments of Ethiopia and North Korea. Samora
insisted, however, that “North Koreans have now finished their work
and are leaving” Gafat.[14]
The General’s statements regarding the North Korean presence at
Homicho and Gafat were frequently contradictory, however. They
alternated “between ‘we will continue to source from North Korea’ and
‘we haven’t sourced from North Korea in the past year’ as well as ‘the
North Koreans have left’ and ‘some of the North Koreans may still be
around.’”[15] It is therefore possible that Pyongyang’s involvement in
Gafat and other Ethiopian weapons factories continued beyond 2008.
Enquiries into the affiliation of the ‘Korea Ryong Bong General
Corporation’ and the nature and duration of its contract with Gafat is
therefore necessary.
Build It and They Will Come (Again)
Contradictory statements by Ethiopian officials, as well as fresh
suspicions about Gafat’s ties to North Korea, are reasons to continue
to ask questions about whether Pyongyang’s involvement in domestic
arms production persists. Alleged dependency upon North Korean supply
is another. General Samora and other Ethiopian officials have
repeatedly affirmed that METEC-run weapons factories are ‘dependent’
upon North Korean spare parts and machines for their production lines,
as noted above. Provision of any such spare parts, machines or
maintenance services by North Korea would now be sanctioned activity.
Even if cooperation has recently ended, modest but growing evidence
suggests that sanctions may at some stage have been breached by the
Ethiopian government and/or METEC, which controls the two factories in
question. The UN Panel of Experts’ recent interest in Homicho speaks
to the Panel’s concern that any North Korean link with the site may be
in violation of UN Security Council Resolution 1874. Indeed, Homicho’s
subsequent, swift sanitization of its publicized suppliers list
compounds suspicion that interaction between METEC and Pyongyang is
continuing in breach of the current sanctions regime. Furthermore,
North Koreans were acknowledged by officials to still be on the ground
at the Gafat site only months before Resolution 1874 was passed—as
part of a contract between the government-run METEC and the Korea
Ryong Bong General Corporation. Temporally, this takes confirmed
cooperation too close to sanctions territory for comfort.
——————————-
[1] “Defense Officials Impose Last-Minute Impediments on Arms Inquiry
on North Korea,” Embassy Addis Ababa (Ethiopia), 14/01/2008,
#08ADDISABABA87. Accessed via Wikileaks on May 27, 2014.
[2] Homicho Ammunition Engineering Industry—A Fact Sheet, Metals and
Engineering Corporation,,
http://www.metec.gov.et/images/PDF/Homicho%20Ammunition%20Engineering%20Industry.pdf.
[3] “North Korea offers Nigeria missile deal,” Washington Times,
January 28, 2004,
http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2004/jan/28/20040128-114425-6730r/?page=all.
[4] Homicho Ammunition Industry, op cit.
[5] “Ethiopia: Scenesetter for Secretary Rice’s December 5 Visit,”
Embassy Addis Ababa (Ethiopia), November 30, 2007, #07ADDISABABA3430.
Accessed via Wikileaks on May 27, 2014
[6] “Defense Officials Impose Last-Minute Impediments on Arms Inquiry
on North Korea,” op cit.
[7] Ibid.
[8] “Report of the Panel of Experts Established Pursuant to Resolution
1874 (2009),” United Nations Security Council, S/2014/147, pp. 35 -36.
[9] Homicho Ammunition Engineering Industry—A Fact Sheet, Metals and
Engineering Corporation,
http://www.metec.gov.et/images/PDF/Homicho%20Ammunition%20Engineering%20Industry.pdf.
A search using Wayback Machine reveals the fact that reference to the
Korean entity was removed following the UN Panel report.
[10] Gafat Armament Industry, Metals and Engineering
Corporation,
http://www.metec.gov.et/index.php/en/metec-industries/gafat-armament-industry.
[11] For an overview of North Korean weapons systems in the 1990s,
including photographs or drawings, see the “North Korea Country
Handbook,” US Department of Defense, May 1997,
http://fas.org/nuke/guide/dprk/nkor.pdf.
[12] Andrea Berger, “A Legal Precipice? The DPRK-Uganda Security
Relationship,” 38 North, November 13, 2014,
http://38north.org/2014/11/aberger111314/.
[13] Tewodros Rufael, “Design of Enterprise Resource Planning:
Framework and Its Implementation,” Supervised by Dr. Subhash Chandra
at the Graduate Studies of Addis Ababa University, November 2007, pp.
8-9.
[14] “Defense Officials Impose Last-Minute Impediments on Arms Inquiry
on North Korea,” op cit.
[15] Ibid.
Received on Wed Dec 24 2014 - 23:16:05 EST